A little-known secret about car dealers that they don't want you to know: Dealers want to sell cars for more money than they paid for the cars themselves. I know, right? The nerve.

Anyway, it's up to you to research, figure out the dealer's cost to buy the car and decide if the price they're charging is fair or not.

Pricing I understand. I’m more concerned about some things I’ve been hearing where they tell you one price then charge more when you get there. Weird stuff like that. Just want to see if anyone had good experiences with them. I don’t want to waste my time I barely have any time as it is.

>I’m more concerned about some things I’ve been hearing where they tell you one price then charge more when you get there.

Pretty standard for all dealerships tbh. They show the price of the car but then when you get to finance you'll see things like vin etching added on for $700.

No matter what dealership you go to, always ask for a copy of the out-the-door-price when talking to the salesman. this gives you ALL of your charges for that specific vehicle (add-ons, fees, taxes, etc.). So then when you get to finance their should be no surprises (though finance will push additional warranties on you - just decline them unless you really do want them).

There's two things I look at when going to a dealer, the sales department and the service department. I consider them two different entities.

You may want to buy a car where they give you the best price, but take it elsewhere for service, so when you're looking at dealerships take that into consideration.

Honestly fuck car dealerships. I wish for a day when this old, antiquated scam of a business model is gone and we can just buy cars directly from the manufacturer. Why is it that in order to buy a car I have to go through a 3rd party that will try to take on bullshit accessories, markup fees, bullshit warranties, etc. and I have to sit with these scumbag salespeople over the course of days to make a purchase. I will never buy a new car again unless I can buy it exclusively online and have it delivered to my house.

If you're a Costco member, they have pre-negotiated pricing at local dealers.

That's a lot of words to say you have nothing helpful to add.

Seriously. I know what I want. My credit is amazing. I haven’t missed a bill payment on anything pretty much my entire life. I’m as straightforward as it comes with these things. But somehow I’ll still need to spend 8 hours in a dealership. I just want a car I know nobody else has fucked up. My used purchases have not been great.

I don’t know if this is still a thing, but I remember many dealerships would have an “internet” salesperson or dept. The trick is to crunch all the numbers yourself and come up with a reasonable price (car + tax/title/license + reasonable dealership fee). Plus interest rate if financing. Then call the internet sales section at the dealership and offer that “out the door” price/terms. Say you want to leave a deposit right there over the phone and pick up the car when it’s ready, bypassing the sales dept.

Just deal with the online side of them. Our last 3 cars i bought were that way.

Find something you want optioned the way you want, send them an email with the VIN, say, "This is the exact build i want, these are the MUST have features and these are the ones i don't care about.

I'm not interested in anything else that isn't on this list.

My bank will give me the following finance terms, i'm happy to go through you if you are in the same ballpark (dealers make some nice coin off the financing). I am ready to buy today\next week\next month (whatever you want). Looking at a few places, here is what I believe to be a fair offer. I have a trade, here is its mileage, VIN, and condition, I expect to get X for it based on Y, and i will not be interested in doing business with you if you tell me that is possible, only to come back with different numbers unless something substantial is found during inspection.

Please respond with your best and final offer, and the VIN of the vehicle you have in mind, I'm not interested in back and forth or anything that differs substantially from what i wrote above.

Take that, clean up the language a bit, plug in your numbers, and then copy and paste it in an email to every dealership that is under an hour drive away.

I think i spent a grand total of like 3 hours, including signing papers, when i bought our last car.

Just be honest in what you want, reasonable in your expectations, and ready to move on stuff. Its silly to spend days and back and forth over a couple hundred bucks on a trade in price or getting "the best" price you can. If the dealer knows you aren't going to eat up their time, and they will make a quick buck on the transaction, they are happy to have your business and move on to the next guy.

The more of their time you eat, the less likely you are to get a good price, because now they have to recoup that time they could have spent on other customers.

Repeat the process once or twice and then your dealership knows you are a quick and easy customer, and it only gets easier.

Part of the problem i feel is not all dealership people are good sales people. You know this when they pull out the 4 square, they are just relying on tactics someone else taught them.

Be up front and honest, don't try and get something past them, and its a whole different experience.

And the second you don't get that vibe from them, walk out the door.

I wish I was competent enough to do that. Unfortunately I don’t know jack shit about any of this stuff. I’d have to do a lot of research for that. I guess I could give it a shot and see what I can do. If my trucks tranny wasn’t dying I would prob never but another car again. Shit is just stressful.

The hardest part would be figuring out a fair loan interest rate in today’s market. But you can see dealer’s inventory on website. Easy enough to calculate tax. Maybe another $750 or so for other fees? Call and say this is the stock # of the car I want (from website), this is my out the door price, I don’t have time to come sit with salesperson. Of course, they may very well just laugh and hang up. I’m not sure what the climate is like dealing with dealers in today’s market. But it all worked perfectly for me when I did it in 2008 for my first (and only) new car purchase… Good luck and just be prepared to walk away if they become unreasonable at the very end of negotiation!

I don’t like them. They were really condescending/rude to me when I was shopping around. I ended up walking right out the door.

i just got a car recently - if you have an account with a credit union or other small bank, try to get a third-party preapproval for a loan - that way you can go in and tell them your out the door budget. they want to make a sale, especially the last week of the month - i was able to negotiate heated seats installed and still paid about sticker price for a 2018 gently used vehicle, even after fees.

right now every dealership is going to be a scumbag take it or leave it attitude due to low inventory and such. financing rates also sucks right now, best bet to shop around, freehold toyota was ok for me, when i was shopping new brunswick toyota gave me the best price. if you can wait till like mid 2023 i would wait to be honest thats when it should start to get better.